I’ve made going to the gym on Saturdays an ongoing schedule over the last few months. My main goals I wanted to acheive were to strengthen my muscles and get better cardiovascular health. Looking back on my early efforts, I feel proud to say that I have made significant progress. I could hardly complete the easiest exercises at first, and my endurance has definitely increased. But despite this, my trainer always hyped me up and made sure I completed the exercises.
I’m determined to stick with this, and I’m excited for further developments in the upcoming months.
So far, in terms of recycling, we have continued to collect paper and cardboard and deliver it to the recycling center in exchange for money. However, as of last month, there was a slight deviation from our usual schedule. Sometimes we would have 2nd graders assisting us with our work and us helping with their compost for a short time. During this experience, we taught them about our service group and demonstrated what we do. Starting then, whenever we had some free time after collecting papers from classes, we would go meet the second graders and assist them with their compost. Usually during these rounds, we would go see the biogas plant as well as collect food waste from the canteen and staff kitchen to dump into the biogas plant. The Biogas plant converts the food waste into biogas (methane), but so far we have only used this gas to boil water and make popcorn.
For the past few days, a lot of paper has been piling up in the classrooms. This round we had around 2-4 boxes worth of paper and cardboard, which we had to organize into separate boxes to store in the recycling shed and took to the recycling center.
Looking at the vegetation the 2nd graders made (Pic by Ms. Dilini)Organizing everything into different boxes (Pic by Ms. Dilini)Unloading all the boxes off the truck at the recycling center (Pic by Ms. Dilini)
HeArt of Sri Lanka was the trip I had chosen for my final year of Week Without Walls. The last trip I went to was Down South which tested my endurance greatly, but for this year I wanted a change, so I picked a trip that didn’t test by physical abilities.
Day 1 started with us getting to school early at 5:30 and catching the train to Kandy which was about a 2-hour ride. Before this, I had never been on a train, so this was my first experience. Even though the train ride was very bumpy I was still somehow able to take a nap even if it was just for a small moment. Once we arrived in Kandy we immediately went to the Sri Dalada Maligawa (Tooth Relic Temple) where we got to see where the tooth relic of Buddha is preserved and see the taxidermy of Raja (The Elephant who carried the tooth relic for a long time during the Kandyan Parades). Inside the temple was packed with people left and right, and was a struggle to get around. In the temple to separated into small groups, to find something we could draw in the art journals we had made before the trip. After visiting the temple we stopped at a pizza place to have lunch and our entire group turned into a bunch of starving vultures with everyone trying to reach for the pizza. After we had lunch we took our bus to ‘Helga’s Folly‘ which was the place we were staying. During our stay there we were invited to partake in an Artmaking session with local artist Rudrani Devi Das, where we made a bunch of different art pieces. After dinner, we ended the day with a game of Murder Mystery and closed for the night.
Day 2 we packed our bags departed from Helgas Folly, and left for Matale where we visited a Batik Factory under the name of Baba Batik Factory. During our visit, we learned how they made Batik and also made some of our own, and during the end, we were given 40% off of all their products. We had lunch in Diyabubula at Laki Senanayake’s (Sri Lankan artist) house, where we also explored all his creations at the site and took the time to draw and photograph some of his work. After this, we departed for Back of Beyond, Pidurangala where we would be staying for two nights.
Batik Designs (Pic by Thisali)
Day 3 started with us departing for the Polonnaruwa Ancient City where we biked to all the ruins and temples in the area, and visited the Uththararamaya (Gal Vihara) which is a rock temple situated within the Ancient City of the Polonnaruwa Kingdom. After visiting Gal Vihara we had Ice Cream to cool ourselves down while there were a bunch of monkeys surrounding our group trying to jump us. We got back from the Ancient City and had lunch at where we were staying (Back of Beyond). Afterward, we did a natural art material workshop where we had to make an art piece based on land materials, which meant we weren’t given paintbrushes, and had to find resources surrounding us like leaves and sticks.
Gal Viharaya (Pic by Thisali )Ancient City (Pic by Thisali)
Day 4 we woke up at 4:45 – 5:00 to get ready to hike up Pidurangala Rock which took about 30-40 minutes to get to the top just before the rays of light reached the sky. Once we came back we packed our bags and departed to the Kandalama Heritance Hotel which was designed by Sri Lankan Architect Geoffery Bawa where we had lunch and also made art. Next, we took the bus to Habarana and arrived at The Other Corner for the last night.
Pidurangala Sunrise HikeKandalama Heritance Hotel
Day 5 we packed our bags and did our final activity for the trip which was the Village Cooking Class, where we made a green bean sambol that we later on ate for lunch. Lastly we got our bags and departed from the hotel and were made our journey back to the school.
Lately, during the weekends, I’ve constantly found myself running out of activities and lying around at home the entire day, especially when I didn’t have work or finished everything I needed to do. Which resulted in me feeling constantly tired, and having a lack of energy. Which I took it upon myself to go to the gym even if it’s the last thing on my mind, and turn into a better version of myself. I contacted people around, asking if they knew anyone who worked as a personal trainer in a gym nearby, and awaited an answer, to which I received one during October break, and started my first session. This was my first time going to the Gym, so I was extremely nervous as to what was to come.
During my first session, I was introduced to my trainer and reminded her that I wanted to do a workout to strengthen my upper body, As we went into the gym I was immediately intimidated by all the machines around me, and didn’t even know how any of them work. For each machine I did, my trainer had to demonstrate to me how to use the machines, and how my posture should be. After the first demonstration, she instructed me to copy after her and was baffled because I could not even lift the amount of weights she did, let alone budge it even a little bit.
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